A Mole's View...Part 1

I put the second orb into my jacket pocket. There would be plenty of time learn more about the ORC’s themselves later on.

I held the first orb, the one from the mole, in my hand and spoke the password. “Betsy.”

Immediately, I felt like I was swept up in a vortex of swirling colors, like being inside of a kaleidoscope that was being adjusted by an over-excited 5 year old child. I suppose it would have been quiet disorienting if I had a stomach to empty, but that wasn’t a concern for me. Instead, I relaxed and let the images sort themselves out. It didn’t take very long.

The image coalesced into a view from the back seat of older taxi cab. The tinny sounds of Indian music played in the background. I could make out the back of the purple turban-covered head of the driver of the cab, a bearded Sikh man of middling years.

The cab was moving, but it was dark outside, so the passing images were the neon signs of fast food restaurants, gas stations and convenience stores that could be found on the outskirts of nearly every American town or city.

I tried to focus on details that might give me a better clue as to where the cab was, but I found that I was constrained to the view of the person who had made the orb itself. The images and sounds that the maker of the orb saw and heard were the only images and sounds that came through on this recording. Again, rather than fight the frustration of such a limited view of events, I sat back and relaxed, content to see and hear what the mole was able to show me.

The cabbie’s head bobbed to the rhythms of the music coming from his cassette deck. The mole, however, was only cursorily interested in him. The image kept shifting from the windshield ahead to the piece of paper in the mole’s rough fingers. An address and a phone number showed on the paper: 25343 Covington Way and 555-9832.

The mole glanced back up to the display on the dashboard showing fare adding up. $19.51.

“Hey up, how much further?” The voice of the mole was loud and deep.

The cabbie looked back at the mole in the mirror as he responded. “Not much further, Sir. You get where you go when Gurmeet drive you, no funny business, OK?”

When Gurmeet turned his attention back to the road, the mole caught a small glimpse of his own face in the mirror. It was a rough, masculine face. It was the face of a man who faced many hard times in his life and had overcome those challenges through sheer force of will and more than a little dishonesty. I had seen similar looks on the faces of hundreds of perpetrators that I had arrested as a cop. The icy blue eyes were framed by a prominent brow ridge that sported bushy blonde eyebrows. The nose was on the long side, with a slight hook to the right (left because of the mirror?). His thin lips were firmly pursed in a look of not-so-slight anger or agitation. His upper lip and cheeks showed the stubble of a couple of days gone without shaving, but the stubble wasn’t long enough to hide the long, puckered scar that ran from the left corner of his mouth almost all of the way to his ear. His skin also showed several pock marks from a history of terrible acne or some other skin disease.

Seeing his reflection in the mirror seemed to irritate the man even further, as his mouth twitched in anger as looked back at the tolling meter. $22.27.

“You told me the fare would be no more than $25. I’m going to hold you to that, Gurmeet.”

Gurmeet bobbed his head and chirped out a polite answer. “Yes, Sir, that is the price I quoted. You no pay more.”

The image bobbed as the mole nodded his agreement and grunted in response. He looked down to the paper in his hand one more time and watched as he crumpled it up and tossed it to the floor of the cab.

“Sir, we are pulling up now.”

Good to his word, Gurmeet had the left turn signal on and was cranking hard on the wheel to pull the cab into the unlit driveway of a large McMansion nestled in amongst its nearly identical fellows in an otherwise unremarkable suburban community.

The cab stopped on the sloped driveway. Gurmeet got out of the cab and opened the passenger door behind him. “You see, Gurmeet knows stuff. That will be $24.78, please.”

The mole got up out of the cab, grabbing his small, worn backpack with his right hand. With his left hand he pulled out the two bills that were in his pants pocket. “Here, keep the change, and buy yourself a new air freshener, will you?” The mole easily stood six inches taller than Gurmeet, who did not appear to be a small man himself.

Gurmeet looked down at the crumpled up twenties in his hand and nodded eagerly. “Thank you, Good Sir. Here is my card. You call me direct if you need a ride back to the airport. I give you good deal, OK?”

The mole nodded and grunted. “Sure. Good night, pal.”

The mole watched from the sidewalk as Gurmeet slammed his door shut and jumped back into the front. With a friendly wave, Gurmeet back out of the driveway and sped off back in the direction of the airport. The wailing of the sitars and the female singing her cries of long lost love dwindling into the night as the cab turned from Covington Way back towards the main road.

The mole hoisted his backpack onto his left shoulder, glanced at the address plate next to the double door and began walking around the side to the back door.

With the music from the cab now gone, the night air was quiet. As with all of the homes nearby, the yard was perfectly manicured, with the grass mowed to the standardized golf course length and the bushes and hedges all trimmed to look neat and uniform. There were a number of smaller trees scattered throughout the yards, but they were still too young to stand on their own. This was clearly a recent development. Many of the houses looked to still be unoccupied.

The mole made his way to the elevated back deck of the huge house. The sounds of his heavy boots thumping on the wooden steps seemed loud, but he didn’t hesitate. He tromped up to the sliding glass door and tested it to see if it was open. Once he discovered that it was locked, he tried to peer inside, but the darkness inside the home was even deeper than night outside. Grunting again, he rapped loudly on the glass with his right hand, a thick ring on his ring finger making the loudest crack on the glass.

At first nothing happened. Then a face appeared just inside the glass door, almost as if by magick. It was a thin face of a woman who had seen almost as many hard times as the mole. She looked him up and down, eyes darting back and forth as she seemed to be watching for others as well. Finally a pale hand emerged from the darkness beneath her face and clicked the lock on the door. She nodded towards the handle on the door before both hand and face evaporated back into the inky darkness inside.

He opened the door and slipped inside the home, also glancing back to make sure that he was alone and unseen.

The image from the orb went completely dark, like I experienced when calling the Shadow to use it for travel from place to place.

When the image returned, it was quite clear that the mole was not standing inside the dining room of a suburban McMansion, but was now inside a worn out industrial warehouse of some sort. The light came from flickering fluorescent bulbs swaying in a stiff breeze. Puddles of water reflected that dim light, echoing with the drips of more water that also came from above.

The thin woman stood in a plain blue jumpsuit and boots, her frazzled hair framing her anemic looking face. Her arms were crossed as if she had been waiting impatiently. She was alone in the large, abandoned looking room.

Her sharp, nasal voice cut through the air as she spoke. “Name?”

The mole looked her up and down, glanced about the room. His eyes took in the darkened doorways and halls leading from this rather large, empty room. “Nick, Nicholas Kolkiwiecz. Who’re you?”

“You may call me Rose. State your purpose here.”

The mole shrugged. “Look, I heard that this was the place to come if you have certain talents and are looking for work. I sure as Hell hope that I’m in the right damn place or I’m going to make someone pay for my trip out here. I need work, not extra expenses.”

Rose didn’t look all that impressed. She uncrossed her arms and took a couple of steps towards Nick. Her head titled slightly to the left and down as she spoke, a sly smile creeping over her plain, drawn face. Her eyes were perhaps her only attractive feature, as they were large, almond shaped and brown. The rest of her face was pale to the point of being almost sickly. Her thin eyebrows had been drawn in after having been shaved, plucked or waxed clean. Her nose was long and thin, ending in two flaring nostrils that showed the redness of a drug addict while her lips were thin and colorless. Her cheekbones nearly protruded through her pale skin.

“You’re in the right place if you are looking for work, but I need to make sure that you have the talent to make it worth the while of my masters for you to speak with them. What talents do you bring to this party, Nick?”

Her lips pulled back as she smiled. Her teeth glittered and gleamed in the dim light, reflecting off of the silver and gems that were set in them. Her canines were the most modified, having been lengthened and given a fang-like sharpness to them.

Nick nodded, standing his ground. “Good enough. I’m very talented with my hands.” He let the backpack slide to the ground and brought his hand to show Rose. His hands were thick with calluses, showing the obvious wear and tear of a person who worked with tools on a daily basis.

Rose came even close, touching his hand with hers. Her fingers ended in talon-like nails that were painted a bright red. Her touch must have been cold, because Nick flinched ever so slightly with her touch.

“That’s nice, Nick, but we don’t need any cabinets built here.” She stroked her fingers up and down his right hand, her nails leaving a slight trail of white marks where they passed. “The things we’re building require a bit more finesse than your hands seem to be capable of producing, if you know what I mean?” Her smile was only a few inches from his hand now.

“Look Lady, I only work with wood and metal when I need to, when I need to look like I make an honest living.” He pulled his hand back from her face as she ran a tongue over the gems in her upper teeth. “My talents lie with other, less conventional materials.”

“Oh, and just what might those be, dear Nick?” Her eyes ran up and down his body, as if she were she was very hungry and he was a great meal.

Nick knelt down to his backpack. “Step back now, Miss, I don’t want you to get hurt.” He reached into the pack and pulled out a small black controller with a knob and several buttons. He then flipped back the flap covering the opening and stood up.

Curious, Rose knelt down towards the pack despite Nick’s warning. “Show me what surprise you have for us.”

“Alright, but I warned you.”

Nick mashed a button with one of his fingers and the pack rustled as if something was coming alive.

Rose leaned closer.

Nick turned the knob on the controller and pressed another button. The thing in the backpack erupted from inside with a leap to land right in front of the startled Rose. It was a raccoon with glassy eyes and a permanent snarl to its face. As Nick manipulated the buttons and the knob, the creature moved with almost lifelike precision and speed.

Rose laughed with delight as she reached out to touch the fur. “It feels so life-like. Did you use real fur?”

Nick nodded. “It’s almost all real, from the bones and sinew to the fur. It’s a real raccoon.”

She marveled at the creature as he made it dance and maneuver around in front of her. “How does it move around?”

“That’s my little secret. Let me just say that you can’t buy it in stores. But my talents are for sale, if you know what I mean.”

Rose looked up from the zombified ‘coon and back up to Nick with a new kind of appreciation. “Can you do this with other creatures? Bigger creatures?”

Nick nodded again. “Yep, anything that’s got a body with bones, muscles and skin. The bigger they are, the easier they are to work with.”

Rose smiled again, this time it was the smile of someone who is pleasantly surprised. “I think, Nick, that you need to speak to my masters.”

(To be continued…)